Among Newspapers and Periodicals (July 4)

Published:Ekho, No. 11, July 4, 1906.

      Published according to theEkhotext.Source:Lenin
	  Collected Works,

      Progress Publishers,1965,

      Moscow,Volume 11,

      pages94-95.Translated:Transcription\Markup:R. CymbalaPublic Domain:Lenin Internet Archive

      (2004).You may freely copy, distribute,
	display and perform this work; as well as make derivative and
	commercial works. Please credit “Marxists Internet
	Archive” as your source.•README

Ourobservations inEkho, No. 9, on the historical role of the boycott
and on the significance of non-party revolutionary

			    organisations[1]have evoked
characteristic replies from the extreme Right and the extreme Left wing of the
bourgeois democrats.

Aswas to be expected,Myslwas offended by our use of the term
“bourgeois democrats” and angrily evades the main issue. It writes:

“Ekhoeven finds ’bourgeois democrats’ in the ’Soviets of
Workers’ Deputies’, which are purely proletarian class organisations.... One can
hardly go further than that.”

“Ekhoeven finds ’bourgeois democrats’ in the ’Soviets of
Workers’ Deputies’, which are purely proletarian class organisations.... One can
hardly go further than that.”

Youradical gentlemen must remember that most of the Soviets of Workers’
Deputies did not remain “purely proletarian”. They very often
accepted delegates from soldiers, sailors, office employees and peasants. Would
it not be better to tell uscandidlywhy you don’t like the term
“bourgeois democrats” instead of avoiding disagreements by
quibbling?

Rechis quite beside itself with rage. In their opening remarks against
us the Cadets handle us with kid gloves, as it were, “not desiring to say
anything offensive”. What perfect gentlemen! But towards the end these
Cadets swear like ... like troopers. Our appraisal of the boycott is dubbed
“clownish, or impenetrable stupidity”. Oh, what gentlemen these
Cadets are!

Rechwrites:

“Atall events, let us place on record thatthe objectof the
    Bolshevik tactics was to fight for the convocation of the Duma. And the
    object of all this beating the breast and shouting about the necessity of a
    boycott was to mislead the government.”

“Atall events, let us place on record thatthe objectof the
    Bolshevik tactics was to fight for the convocation of the Duma. And the
    object of all this beating the breast and shouting about the necessity of a
    boycott was to mislead the government.”

Stopjoking, gentlemen! You know perfectly well that our idea was quite
different. The object of the boycott was to sweep away the Witte Duma, just as
the Bulygin Duma was swept away. Although it failed to achieveits own,

i. e.,its direct and immediate object, the boycott nevertheless wasindirectlyof advantage in that, among other things, it distracted the
attention of the government. In this case, too, as always, revolutionary tactics
were the best means of developing the class-consciousness and fighting
efficiency of the proletariat, and of indirectly ensuring the achievement of
half-hearted reforms in the event of failure to achieve complete victory.

[1]See pp. 77-82 of this volume.—Ed.